Should NASA turn Voyager I around and bring it back to Earth?

I read the other day that Voyager I will run out of gas in 2025. That's just 23 years away.

Should NASA turn it around and put the pedal to the metal to get it back to the Earth? It probably cost a lot of money to build. If we get it back, they can gas it up and send it the other direction to see if whatever they're looking for is over there. Otherwise it will have been a total waste.

saxitoxin wrote:I read the other day that Voyager I will run out of gas in 2025. That's just 23 years away.

Should NASA turn it around and put the pedal to the metal to get it back to the Earth? It probably cost a lot of money to build. If we get it back, we can gas it up and send it the other direction to see what's over there. Otherwise it will have been a total waste.

Mets?

That's not how it works.. Saving money is not the work of the government. It's better for everyone at NASA to get more money to build a new one.

What if NASA just sent it back halfway, like to Jupiter - sent something to meet it there and gas it up, then turned it around and let it go back again? They'd lose a little time having to backtrack, so that's a possible drawback.

saxitoxin wrote:What if NASA just sent it back halfway, like to Jupiter - sent something to meet it there and gas it up, then turned it around and let it go back again? They'd lose a little time having to backtrack, so that's a possible drawback.

Wouldn't the thing they built to go to Jupiter cost nearly as much to build as the old one? Even if it didn't, it would be fueling up something that would be pretty obsolete by that point. In fact, the first one is probably already obsolete. Send the old one back and recycle it to make a brand new, state of the art waste of money.